narrowing the margins...

Last week, I wrote this: “It is as if we say ‘Sure, there is “goodness” outside of church, but it lacks value because it is not placed in the right context.’ In essence, my goodness is better than your goodness. Why? Because I am doing it aware of God and you are not.”

Not only have we in many ways marginalized the efforts of others for the reason I stated above, we have also marginalized the people themselves. I used to marginalize some of them by calling them “Good Ol’ Boys”. This basically stemmed out of this “church centered” view that I held for so long as opposed to a more “way of Jesus centered” view. Most of my blog posts have been dealing with the difference between these two views and my most recent posts have been attempts to poke some holes in and identify problems with the church centered view I am abandoning. Good ol’ boys were the guys at church that came, but didn’t do much. They never taught classes, did much in worship services, lead any committees…maybe they led a prayer or counted people, but overall they really didn’t bring much “spiritual” value to the table. They were good guys, but they didn’t really seem to be “on fire” for God or any other cliché we use. In our church sub-culture, they were just members.

Now I know we are called to be more than “nice men”. We are to be “new creations”. So what I am not saying is just be decent, that is all there is to it and there is nothing left to discuss. What I am saying and have been repeatedly is that what our churches have handed to us as true spirituality is in so many ways in addition to what Jesus pointed us to. (see my post “the way to The Way”) Within our church sub-culture, these good ol’ boys don’t have much value beyond their monetary contributions and the occasional “help a family move day” that they might show up for. I find myself abandoning so much of what the church has said this way of Jesus is all about and attempting to take Jesus at His word in what he says it is all about. The “church centered” view is full of exclusiveness and valuing of others based on what I perceive they are doing for God (read: what they are doing for the church.)

Maybe they can’t sing, lead great prayers (whatever that means), teach deep theological classes, deliver solid sermons, or a whole host of other church things. If they don’t play a prominent role at church, do we begin to devalue them? Beyond good ol’ boys, there are a whole host of other classifications of people that don’t quite fit in. I knew a guy once who cut his hair (he was in his 40’s and had long hair for years) because an older and deservedly well respected member (I respected him too) told him that he could have more influence or credibility with others if he did so. I understand differences in generations and times, but this man was basically told “If you want to play an effective role in this church paradigm, you need to look the part.”

There are so many people that “don’t look the part” or aren’t skilled in our typical up front church stuff that are being undervalued around us because of it. As I have gotten to know some of these people I find there are usually layers of depth and beautiful talents I arrogantly don’t expect. They are so often the most gracious people among us, and they usually are much better at mixing in with the community and creating relationships than most church leaders including myself.

A few years ago I found myself unemployed for six months. It was extremely hard and we did everything we could to make it through as well as possible. Our families helped us in anyway they could and we wouldn’t have made it without them. Not that I expected or was looking for others to bail me out, but besides them, there was one other guy who did something that really made all the difference one month. He was a good ol’ boy from the back row that never taught a class, never led a prayer and never led a song. But, apparently he kept some money in an account that he used from time to time to help someone else who may need it at some point –that month it was me.

In so many ways our churches are shallower because we have overlooked people or unnecessarily tried to make them look like us. I often look at those of us who do “fit the part” or who do posses the “valued” skills in our churches and wonder what would happen if that changed. What if we for some reason stopped fitting the part or our skill began to fall short? Would we loose value? I also wonder what would happen if the paradigm shifted. What if we weren’t “worship service” centered? Would who we value become more inclusive? What if we didn’t have everyone clap for the Christian college president visiting our church, but we worked harder at including the easily overlooked?

I can’t end this post without writing that our most egregious marginalizing has been done to women which is a topic I plan to write about in the coming weeks…